The Immigration Question in 1891

A friend showed me a box of old area newspapers from as far back as the 1890s -- newspapers from Hudson and River Falls, Wisconsin, the Twin Cities and a few other areas. There is fascinating information in these papers and it is easy to see how much times have changed and how they have not changed.

For instance, immigration is huge debate in today's political debate. In 1891, the Wisconsin-Minnesota border country was a major stopping point for Scandinavian immigrants and other areas of Europe -- Germany, Ireland, Italy, France, etc.

One paper is from the May 27, 1891 edition of the North, a weekly newspaper published in Minneapolis every Wednesday and edited by Luth Jaeger, a Norwegian immigrant. According to is masthead, The North was "a weekly newspaper in the English language, devoted to the inculcation of American principles among the Scandinavian citizens of the United States." The goal of the paper was to Americanize Norwegian immigrants into the American way of life. It was published from 1889-1894.

Jaeger was a member of the Norwegian-American intelligentsia and he was nominated for Minnesota Secretary of State on the Democratic ticket on Sept. 14, 1886.

Below is photo of an ad from the newspaper that I took with my digital camera. Below the picture is a quote taken from the newspaper about the issue of immigration.



"The national life, as developed in the great port of entry - New York - is a huge crucible into which has been dumped in overwhelming masses the sweepings of European cities. The scum at the top, the dregs at the bottom, we wait with anxiety the slow process of national assimilation which shall fuse with the old Dutch and Anglo-Saxon stock, the stolid German, the mercurial Frenchman, and the fiery Celt, and, out of the compound, present the American nation of the future."

Luth Jaeger
The North

Barack Obama

Tiger Beat Cover Clinches Slumber Party Vote


WASHINGTON, DC—According to a poll released Monday by Teen Zogby!, both Barack Obama's approval and dreaminess ratings among slumber party–attending tweens have risen to 82 percent following last week's publication of the Tiger Beat cover pictorial "Hangin' With Barack!"

"Barack is sooooo hot!" said 12-year-old Tiger Beat subscriber Beth Majors upon reading the issue, which included a "supercute" poster of Obama leaning against the Lincoln Memorial and an interview in which he revealed that his most inspirational hero is "you." "He so totally has my support. Obama in '08!"

Obama is expected to remain a solid favorite with the giggling-and-talking-until-4 a.m. voting bloc, as hunky war hero John McCain, his closest contender, is widely considered by the slumber party demographic to be a gross dork.

Losers Pick Losers in Iowa Caucus - OTBL Regroups for 2012 Election

Like this is any surprise? Ontheborderline candidate Ron Paul explodes into 5th place finish.
Achieving the seemingly impossible, generating less enthusiasm than Fred Thompson, Ron Paul finishes with a stellar 9.7% of the GOP'ed Iowa caucus vote. Way to go borderliners, we've always known you've had your finger on the pulse of America's least popular opinion. An even brighter note, 9-11 candidate Rudy Gulianni winds up in the Iowa Whine Cellar with 3%.

Ron Paul's Kool-Aid Drinking Klan Unites!

In the picture below of George W. Bush bringing his fear and smear campaign to Hudson, Wisconsin in 2004, how many ontheborderliners can you pick out of the crowd. Look will have to look very hard, because most of them were on their knees licking Bush's boots...

O. Schmitt! This Guy's From Gilman...

Who is that guy?

When the college bowl games hit, there is always some great stories that come to the surface. Owen Schmitt from Gilman -- east of Cornell on US 64 -- left his imprint on bowl fans last night. He rumbled down the field like a dump truck at full throttle -- bound for the end zone on the breakout play of West Virginia's 48-28 victory over Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl.

His story is inspiring! Schmitt overcame anonymity and overcame a childhood that was far from easy. Born with a cleft palate in a family that toted a lunch pail, he once described himself a “a fat little kid with glasses”. He was raised in Gilman, Wis., a town of 474 people and maybe twice that many cows.


Read more...
On Last Lick

Schmitt paving way for W. Va.

New Year's Resolution: Understanding The Opposite Sex

The Sun Rises On A New Year

"Yesterday, everybody smoked his last cigar, took his last drink and swore his last oath. Today, we are a pious and exemplary community. Thirty days from now, we shall have cast our reformation to the winds and gone to cutting our ancient shortcomings considerably shorter than ever."

Mark Twain


"Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on, with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us."

Hal Borland

Dr. Bil Earns Coveted 2007 Blogger Lager Award

Dr. Bil - Breaks Out New Year's Bubbly

For most of us, New Years is a time to celebrate a new beginning, but not for loco blogger Dr. Bil.
This Dr. of Liberty lives by the slogan, "out with the old, in with the older".
For the past 3 years him and his pals at ontheborderline.nut have been nursing the same bottle of blogger lager, so why would we expect '08 to be any different.
As anticipated Dr. Bil will make whoopee with his favorite libation, A Rare1776 Vintage Public Education Whine. (it was a very good year according to Dr. Bil and he buys it by the barrel). He even brought out his old tired phrase "and demonstrated it in spades", just for the occasion.
He also dusted off his favorite topic, teacher salaries, the bane of society inflicted on us taxpayers by the nobility of the looting class.
Just for fun we did a little salary research.
Wow, I never knew teachers were rolling in dough like that! I don't know about you, but these bulging wallets sure made me think about getting a teacher job and investing a couple more years to get another Master's Degree.
For a little more fun, let's make a comparison. Teacher Salary vs. Blowhard Oxyconton Addict Radio Host Salary.
Ready!







































































Clearly, the invisible hand of the market is telling us, society needs more blowhard oxycontin addicted radio talk show hosts than looting class teachers.

Public Education & Immigration

The end of the Nineteenth Century saw explosive growth in America’s public schools. Public school expenditures rose from $69 million in 1870 to $147 million in 1890. Public school enrollment increased from 7.6 million in 1870 to 12.7 million in the same decades. The United States was providing more schooling to more children than any other nation on earth, thanks in large part to the nineteenth-century movement for school reform. Yet not all children could attend public schools together. Many Native Americans were sent to special government schools, where they were forced to abandon tribal languages, customs, and dress. African Americans also faced exclusion, and many created their own schools.



By 1900 the United States was becoming increasingly urban. Cities were crowded with immigrants arriving from every part of the globe. Between 1890 and 1930, over 22 million came to the United States, including almost three million children. For them, school was the place where the American dream was nurtured, and the future itself took shape… So powerful was the lure of education that on the day after a steamship arrived, as many as 125 children would apply to one New York school. Thousands of students attended school part time for lack of space. Some classrooms were as crowded as tenements. Yet for many other children, school was nothing more than a mysterious building passed on the way to work. In 1900, only 50 percent of America’s children were in school, and they received an average of only five years of schooling. The remaining children could often be found at work.

Learn more about the history of US public education at the PBS site School.